Gravitation Fan Fiction ❯ Splinters of a Song ❯ = track eight = ( Chapter 9 )

[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]

Warnings & Disclaimers: Same as before, but with some very faint spoilers for ep. 7 of the anime. I know that the last chapter has spoilers from ep. 8 but I am spacing out the time between meeting in the bar to announcing their album release to a more realistic timeline.
A.N. : Sorry for the extremely long delay in getting this chapter out. I was having some serious issues about which direction I wanted to go with this chapter. Again, it's more of a filler chapter leading up to what I want to do next with the story.

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- track eight -

I was dragged out of bed way too early and packed into K's car before I could even squeak a question. My soon-to-be ex-manager drove like a manic through the really early morning traffic and had me out of the car and into NG before the sun even though about rising over the city. I was too tired to complain, hiding my eyes behind my glasses and muffling yawns in Kumagorou's soft fur as I stumbled behind K's wake. For the most part, the rest of the building was empty save for a couple of janitors mopping a stretch of the floor, and a few people who never seem to do anything but work and whine when they are not working. I yawned again, and hoped that there was a bed where we were going. I needed to catch up on my beauty sleep.

He opened a door to one of the conference rooms, reached over, grabbed me by the arm, and dragged me into the room after him. I batted at his hand with Kumagorou, and then blinked at all the stuff set up about the place. There was a tray with a big carafe and sweet rolls, a mike, a TV camera and a big screen TV. People crawled around the equipment, pausing to call out 'good mornings' before going back to work. I blinked at them then glared at K.

"You should have told me this was a meeting," I said, stamping a foot.

"It's not my fault you weren't listening to me while you were getting dressed," K replied, handing me a cup of steaming coffee and giving me a slap on the back. "Now, let's show your American label what we've got!"

I stuck my tongue out at K and flopped into a seat, sipping at the too hot coffee and yawning. I wanted to be back in bed, having spent a great deal of the night before just talking with Touma about what-ifs. Well, I was talking; he was giving me his stranger's smile in between yawns and arranging lines of music in his notebook. After I started to repeat myself and he started falling asleep, we had called it a night.

I wanted to puzzle over Touma's behavior, but oh, no, Mr. Gun-toting-American-Soon-To-Be-Ex-Manager had to drag me out of bed and halfway across the world to do a satellite feed meeting to my American producers over who knows what at such an evil hour. I took another sip of coffee and pouted at the pink rabbit sitting in front of me. The moment K left my services, I was going to change my locks. Not that it would stop him, but at least I would feel like it would stop him. Nodding to myself, I gave an 'eep' of surprised as some woman assaulted my face with powder and blush and lipstick. I attempted to wave her off, then used Kumagorou as a shield to get her to back off.

"Hey! Who do you think I am? Gackt? That's enough make up!" I coughed and add a line about evil make up people onto my mutterings about evil soon-to-be-ex-managers.

She gave me a look and moved on to powder someone else's face. I gave K a glare and crossed my arms over my chest. Meanwhile, the American looked completely unconcerned, making sure we were all in some magical positions to the rest of the room and that the lights were hitting us just right before nodding at the rest of the camera crew. There were some flashed from cameras then the TV and the movie camera went live.

I tucked Kumagorou away under the table and flashed a grin as the picture on the screen came onto focus. My two American producers smiled back, one unsuccessfully hiding a yawn. I leaned back, letting go of the child-like antics and got down to business.

It took a while to iron everything out with them, the sun coming into full glory while we worked on the contract for the songs, my ending contract and an offer for renewal, hashing over which song to put on the airwaves first, and whether I was willing to do a tour. I answered honestly and to the point, explaining my less-then-enthusiastic response to the idea of a tour by claiming time off. I also told them that I wanted to give the whole music scene a miss and did not renew the contract, though I know K phrased it better then I did.

I never did have a head for business.

But music that I had the head for. K coaxed me into singing a few lines from the haunted song and I could tell that the producers were interested in it. More then interested if they way they came to attention was anyway I could judge their reactions. And if they reacted, maybe the rest of the world would too, although I know that I won't let myself get dragged to America anytime soon. I had Nittle Grasper to work on now.

The interview completed about the same time that I usually liked getting up at - ten in the morning. I was not about to even guess what time it was back in L.A. but my two producers looked like they were ready to fall asleep in their chairs. I bid them a good night and had the crew cut the feed before I yawned wide enough to break my jaw and let my head fall onto the table.

"Can I go back to sleep now?" I said, practically whining into my hands as I tried to block out the sunlight.

I heard K snicker, and I raised my head high enough to give the blond a glare. What was with all the blonds in my life? They were out to get me; I swear they were, with their high and mighty attitudes and silly little ways.

"You could, but you'll be more comfortable on the sleeper couch in Touma's room," he replied.

I stuck my tongue out at him. "Not with his hyper dizzy assistants and his phone calls and his giving fuzzy glares of death at the fax machines and his demands of not drooling over the leather. . ."

"Fuzzy glares of death?" K repeated in that tone of voice that says he couldn't believe what he was hearing, while giving me a look that screamed that he thought that I was crazy. "Ryuuichi. . ."

"You know -" I tried to mimic Touma's fuzzy glare of death. "That look."

K laughed and gave my hair a ruffle. "You can sleep through a hurricane if you wanted to, so off to his office you go!"

Straightening my hair the best I could, I stuck my nose in the air and went waltzing out of the room and headed for Touma's office. I got lost between the candy machine and the Men's room and ended up in a nice shady spot over looking the open lounge in the center of the building. There were trees and a few fancy chairs to look at, though I was more interested in the nice big soft comfy couch I found right near a quiet corner.

Of course, just as I was settling in a nice comfortable position and I was nearly asleep, a very loud voice had to wake me up. I rolled off the couch with a muffled yelp and peered over the side to see who was yelling so loudly so early in the morning. When I spotted the pink hair, I shook my head and decided to sleep on the floor, grabbing a cushion for a pillow.

Another yell and I peered back below to see Shuuichi hold out a dress to K and Sakano. I blinked, shook my head and went back to try to nap. I did not want to know. I seriously did not want to know. Pulling another cushion off the couch, I used it to cover my ears. I knew I had a voice that can carry easily over a crowded room, but I wasn't so inconsiderate to yell around people that were trying to sleep. He probably never saw me, but that still gave him any right to be yelling.

My brief moment of silence between the cushions was cut short when my upper cushion was pulled away from me. Glaring through staticy hair at Evil Blond Number One - other wise called Touma - I hefted Kumagorou in promise of a Kuma-beam. The blond sis not even blink at me, settling the cushion into it's spot and taking a seat, crossing his leg and placing his gloved hands in his lap. Clear blue eyes, far too clear for a fluffy evil like him, watched me, a smile curving his small pink lips. After several minutes of this torture, I sighed and got up from the floor, tossed the cushion onto the couch and sat down next to him.

"Shuuichi," he said, glancing down at the floor below us. "is having a difficult time right now."

"Shuuichi shouldn't be waving around his kink in front of K," I replied, imparting my experiences from all the years of being under the control of Evil Blond Number Two.

"Are you sure that's his kink?"

"What else would it be?" I eyed Touma and huffed, crossing my arms at his mysterious smile. "Touma. . ."

"Did you ever have any doubts about your sexual identity, Ryuuichi?"

"No, why would I? I knew what I wanted and I never gave it another thought."

He glanced at me from the corners of his eyes, pink lips pressed firmly together before he went back to watching the floor below. I smirked at him, enjoying the stiff way he held his shoulders and the tightening of his hands on his knee. I plucked at the feathered collar of his coat, giving him a gentle smile as he turned to look at me fully.

"It never was an issue that I concerned myself with while growing up," I continued, placing Kumagorou on top of my head. "Beauty is beauty no matter what sex the beautiful person has."

"Besides, for you, not even another person can hold a candle to what your -real-passion is," he said, sighing softly. "You live music, Ryuuichi. You breathe it, speak it, live it, are it. Everything else is just superficial compared to music."

I bit my lower lip, not denying his statement. "And you are a poisonous rose, untouchable, secretive, dangerous despite your beauty. We've both been over this before, Touma."

He nodded. "But Shuuichi hasn't begun to contemplate what his relationship with Yuki would do to both of them. Especially since Yuki has had more women then his brother and father combined and Shuuichi had never dated before."

"Any relationship is difficult in the first stages of life. Let them work it out themselves and try not to get involved, Touma. Yuki can make his own decisions on - "

A slamming door cut off my thoughts before I could get them out of my mouth. Frowning, I craned my neck to see what was going on and saw the man in questions walking hurriedly towards the exit, hands in pockets and smoking like a furnace. Behind him, yelling something about stopping for beautiful women was Shuuichi in a schoolgirl's uniform. I raised both eyebrows and gave Touma a dirty look. Crossing my arms, I flopped back into the couch and stared up at the ceiling.

After a few moments, the blond reached over and patted my shoulder, his voice sounding far too evil and fluffy for his own good, "Some people are not ready for dating people on beauty alone."

"Oh stop rubbing it in," I said, sulking as I brushed his hand off my shoulder. "Can we go to the studio and work on the album now?"

"I'm done here, so I don't mind if we go now. Maybe we can get a head start on other songs for it while we wait for Noriko to show up."

I stretched out, nodded and got up. After a moment, he got up as well and lead the way down the stairs and to his car. A few moments later, we were on our way.